Mom’s voice was as tight as a new clothesline. “Matt, how much longer until the console is ready to go?”

My tummy somersaulted in place.

Matt stopped wrestling with the game system cabling long enough to peek out from behind the TV. “Something’s not working, Mrs. S. But is Otokotronics really, ah, from another world?”

“Yes, Matthew. So are we. But I need you to focus right now.”

He paled, vanishing behind the media center again.

I’d been simmering at being under Mom’s thumb, but she was right. We needed to get into those bots and search the warehouse. Otokotronics was retracing Ko Prime’s footsteps toward the Talisman while we were here screwing around with game controllers.

Mom’s bedroom door creaked open, and a scowling Laramee strode down the hall into the living room.

I was still weirded out by having a cop in my apartment, even if he and Mom were pals. I just hoped he was going easy on Garrett. “Are you done interrogating him?”

“We haven’t even started. That kid just won’t shut up about video games.”

Mom stepped toward Laramee. “Otokotronics is sniffing around not far from the warehouse.”

“I’m aware,” he said before dipping to whisper at her ear.

She jerked, staring up at him, any remaining color drained from her face.

“Hey!” I shouted. “No more secrets.”

“We’re all on the same side, John,” Mom said.

Laramee looked dubious, regarding me like I might pose an active threat to his person. “I only said Garrett is Hiroshi Sengoku’s son.”

“Who?” I asked.

Mom cast a worried look at the TV. “Co-founder of Otokotronics, retired now, got driven out early in the company’s history. It explains Garrett’s bot—Otokotronics M series, an ultra-rare collector’s item. Recalled and discontinued in oh eight before the feds took an interest in their business dealings.”

Laramee whistled low, sitting heavily on the futon. A broken chain tattoo peeked from one sleeve. “That bot?” He tipped his head toward the bedroom. “You sure? That’d be worth … You could buy your own small skyscraper on the other side—and all the employees living in it. Hell, maybe their tram lines too. You could go anywhere you wanted.”

So Garrett was seriously loaded and had family ties to Otokotronics in their corporate hell world. Was that something else I needed to worry about?

Mom shifted her weight. “Matthew, time is of the essence. Do you need assistance?”

Soft cursing drifted from behind the media center. “I can do this.” He sounded like he was convincing himself.

Something tightened in my chest. I stopped myself from dashing back there just to get it done.

Garrett appeared in the hallway with a broad, good-natured smile. “Any luck finding the Talisman?”

Even behind this new bot, he was still recognizably Garrett, the same gangly stance and ill-fitting suit. No sunglasses though. Just almond-shaped eyes in an amber face with cheekbones you could wait out a storm under. This kid did whatever he wanted—stealing bots, jumping through windows. I couldn’t fathom how he had such fine-grained control though.

Mom looked to Laramee. “You disabled his trackers? In case Otokotronics is doing scans?”

Garrett’s bot loped into the living room. “I already took care of that. I even located the backup tracker this time.” He turned his back to us, his hands dipping to his belt buckle. “I can show y—”

“That won’t be necessary,” I said hastily.

Garrett looked put out.

Laramee puckered with distaste. “He … showed me already.”

The tightness in my chest was radiating outward now like I was turning to stone. “Matt, how’s it going?” This whole teamwork thing was exhausting.

He emerged from behind the media center, sweat ringing his armpits, and dusted his hands on his jeans. “Okay, it’s working. TV was on HDMI 2. Always check the inputs, folks.” He gazed around at our motley crew. “Don’t all thank me at once.”

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Laramee snorted.

Once we’d gotten set up and dimmed the lights, I grabbed a controller and took my customary position on the carpet beside Matt—who couldn’t stop addressing Laramee as “sir.”

Mom messed with the console’s settings, pulling a second controller from her purse for Matt, while Laramee and Garrett retreated to the bedroom for actual interrogation.

The TV opened on a split-screen view of a warehouse exterior and derelict parking lot in waning dusk. A cluster of pines hugged a hill on one side, a winding street with parked cars along the other. On each half of the screen a man—no, a bot—stood idly with the usual over-the-shoulder view.

We were finally taking action, but if anything my anxiety increased. Otokotronics could be on their way to the warehouse right now.

I tapped my controller and one of the men started forward. A street light flickered over brown skin and cropped hair, a field jacket on a sturdy frame. Some distant familiarity tingled at the edge of memory. Had I been here before?

Matt’s bot also lurched to life, a compact man with broad shoulders and a halo of ginger locks, the look of a meathead about him.

“Why’re all the bots dudes?” I asked.

“Believe me, they’re not,” Mom said. “These are just the two we pulled from storage and drove out here. All we have are the bots we transited with fifteen years ago.” She perched her hands on her hips. “Okay, here’s the deal. This past weekend, someone matching the girl’s description turned up on the world’s grainiest security camera at this warehouse—multiple times. She may have been staying near here.”

“You think she was dropping off the Talisman! How do we get inside?” The door would surely be locked. And didn’t have a keypad to poke at like on the next building over.

Mom nodded, checking her phone before leveling a finger at the roof of the warehouse. “Skylight. I used the five-finger discount on some tools at work and equipped your bots. But in order to get up there, you’re going to need to learn basic movement—and quickly. Stanton lost visual on Otokotronics a few minutes ago.”

I scrolled through my bot’s inventory, my heart thumping in my ears. Just pen lights and a socket wrench. Hopefully Matt’s bot had some way to get us down once the skylight was opened.

“But Mrs. S,” Matt said. “We already know how to move.” By way of illustration, he spun his bot in a rough circle around a parking spot.

“You really don’t. The first thing—” Mom’s phone buzzed in her hand. “Shit. I need to take this.” She shifted away from the futon, speaking in low tones.

I pushed my bot toward the warehouse’s corrugated metal exterior, resisting the urge to eavesdrop on Mom’s call.

Matt bounced on the carpet. “We can climb that drainpipe. C’mon, I’ll give you a boost.” His bot jerked forward.

“Those aren’t climbable. Let me think a minute.”

Mom murmured into her phone, her voice tight.

Matt’s shoulders slumped. “How do you know if we don’t even try?”

I motioned at the screen. “Look at the metal. Completely smooth.”

“Give me a boost if you don’t want to do it.”

The controller creaked in my hands. “Lemme think a sec.”

Blessed silence fell. Not even the hum of traffic came through the TV. Where were we? I maneuvered my bot around the corner of the building.

Matt’s little redheaded bot galloped after me. “This is next to the old fairgrounds, isn’t it?”

I scanned the split screen. “I knew I recognized this building—from that time we crashed Jeremy Wu’s party, right?”

Recognition flashed in Matt’s eyes. “You mean the one where you and Chris Garza went missing for nearly—”

I felt my cheeks warm as I thrust an elbow into his ribs. He let out a yelp.

Mom stopped mid-sentence on her phone call to stare at me, her eyebrows creeping up her forehead.

I didn’t need him blabbering about that. “Anyway, if I recall, there’s a ladder bolted onto the other side of the building.” I jogged my bot around the perimeter of the warehouse, past more parking and another hangar-type building. The lot stretched toward a stand of trees, a street light illuminating a couple liquor bottles like a modern still life. I drew to a stop under a fire escape ladder affixed to the building and ending a dozen feet off the ground. “Shit.” We weren’t climbing that.

Matt jumped his bot into the air, flailing at the ladder. “If you won’t gimme a boost …” He pawed at the wall, trying to climb it. On his half of the screen, Data collection complete appeared in slender lettering.

He pointed at the words. “What the hell is that?”

Mom glanced at the TV. “Keep at it. Once you’re done with this step, you’ll be able to move the bots well enough to get up to the skylight.”

That sounded … unlikely. But now Matt was going it alone and apparently getting further at this than me? Fine, whatever. We were running out of time. I willed my bot to paw at the warehouse for a handhold, but I kept slipping off.

Soon Data collection complete flashed on my side of the screen before both messages vanished, each replaced with another: Press head to controller to enable BrainLink integration.

“What,” I said flatly.

Mom slid her phone into a pocket. “Go ahead, press your head to the controller. And this is beta firmware, so don’t stop till it’s done or there could be some, uh, minor damage.”

“What?” Mom wanted us to link our brains to this thing? Why did that sound like a good idea?

Matt shifted on the carpet. “Sounds hella sketch, Mrs. S. But I’m all about being a team player.” He slammed the controller to his head, giving me a sidelong smirk. A progress bar dribbled across his section of the screen.

I clenched my teeth. We just needed to get to the skylight, get in and out before Otokotronics showed. But Matt had to make it a whole thing. Mom wouldn’t fry my brain on purpose, right?

Gulping, I pressed my forehead to the flat spot on the controller. A vague tingle spidered through my skull. There we sat, the console chugging through our brains until the progress bars eased to a hundred percent.

Then, a wall of foreign sensory input slammed into me like a fist to the gut.